6-226 Timing Help

[vettelang]

Its alive - kind of. Yesterday after 9 years of work the 54 Eagle Custom fired up for the first time. Was running fairly smooth and then I went to set the timing. By the time I got the light to the 5 degree BTDC range it was running rough and now is not wanting to restart. I would like to verify my setup with someone who also has the 6-226. Where is your number 1 wire with respect to the distributor cap clips and roughly where are your clips (mine would be at 3 oclock and 9 oclock if the crank was 12 to 6)

Thanks for the help!

[joefrazer]

Here's a picture of the distributor in my 53K with the Delco distributor. The cap clips are at the 5:30 and 11:30 positions and the #1 wire is the wire immediately to the left of the pictured clip. I checked my 50K Traveler (Autolite distributor) and it is the same.

[vettelang]

Thanks for the picture. My rotor is almost 180 out at that orientation, but that would not be the compression stroke.....Wish me luck

[Vagabond Russ]

Was the oil pump installed correctly?

[vettelang]

Oil pump aligned with mark when it came apart. I believe it is not aligned as the picture due to the stretch in the old timing chain. Shaft was 180 out. Now much closer to picture Still resisting the urge to start. But there is hope.

[MarkH]

Back in the 70's & early 80's at the height of "planned obsolescence" Chevy V8's had a very undersized pot metal cam gear core with a thick nylon coating to bring the teeth up to chain link size. This was done ostensibly for a "silent" timing chain, and they wore out fairly early by todays standards.
I changed out my fair share of these. Once I knew it had to be close, tore the engine down and every trace of nylon was gone and the "core" teeth were nubs, and literally lifted the chain off the cam gear to remove it.
Even with that much slop, these engines ran pretty good right up until the chain jumped around the gear.

Vastly different engine from yours, but my guess is your symptoms are more than chain stretch could produce. Maybe your timing gear marks weren't aligned on the #1 compression stroke?

[vettelang]

It actually is close to starting. I suspect low voltage at the plugs. When it did run I had jumped direct from the battery to the coil.

[Thomasso]

Is it possible that your timing chain might be off.  When I replaced mine the spacing  was confusing.  I consulted several books and it just confused me more.  10 pins or nine links, it worked out.